Church at Birmingham

10/14/2025

Homewood Church of Christ members gather along with Church at Birmingham to serve the community at First Light Shelter in Birmingham.

07/24/2025

Great enjoyment serving together.

Homewood Church of Christ members gather along with Church at Birmingham to serve the community at First Light Shelter in Birmingham.

10/15/2024

This text has long been illuminating & challenging to me. In my experience, most American Christians think faithfulness should only produce results coinciding with the lefthand column (success; triumph; etc.- unless it's elsewhere), and judge others accordingly. The Spirit indicates faithfulness anywhere will oft produce results in keeping with the righthand column - even if not to those extremes. It will often be the case that those whose lives are crushed & broken (tragedy; poverty; homelessness; etc) suffer as a *result of* faith in God.

10/09/2024

10/01/2024

Further arguments from David Bentley Hart that human consciousness cannot be explained by mere materialist forces of nature (unless, of course, those materialist forces were endowed with the ability to produce consciousness from a non-contingent, infinite Mind and Consciousness).

09/12/2024

“Deification (theosis) is the attaining of likeness to God and union with him so far as is possible.”

- Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, 6th century Christian theologian.

There has been a resurgence of this concept of “deification” more recently in the protestant West (it’s long been a part of Eastern Christian faith). I think we would do well to give more careful consideration of this as the primary feature and goal of salvation. Yes, primary. For all things are “from him, and through him, and for him” (Rom. 11:36; Col. 1:15-20). All is destined for the Divine, for God’s project is to “reconcile all things to himself” (Col. 1:20). But what does that mean for us? Deification (theosis) comes about when we participate in Divine Love - for “God is Love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in that one" (1Jn. 4:8, 16-17). And Divine love is defined in Christ crucified - as sacrificial offering for the good of the other (4:9-10).

Another and even more central passage to this is Philippians 2:5-11. Michael Gorman has produced some excellent material on this text and the nature of divine participation, deification or divination, as living a crucified life. I once preached a lesson in a weekend series (and the whole series was centered around this very concept, lol) that God was a “servant God” - and spent time defining that concept in various texts - drawing on these texts and others (e.g., John 13). Someone vehemently and angrily disputed this. They saw this as a denigration of God. Even calling me on the phone to argue this for some 30 minutes. It was not that she had some basis in these Scriptures, but because it offended her a priori concepts. Yet, this actually misses the very point and purpose of the coming of Christ and the entire project of Creation! (Aside from the nature of God as selfless-Love). It is that we are to be transformed by Divine love expressed and revealed in Christ in whom all the fulness of God dwelt, to become partakers of the divine nature - deified - which means becoming partakers in the crucified Christ (Gal. 2:20; Phil. 3:9-11; Romans 8:17-18; etc.). Living out that same radically sacrificial love. That we would live in God and God in us through eternity - which will entail continued growth in this very concept of Love for ever in the age to come. Eternally growing - as finite, contingent beings - into the Being who is Love.

09/01/2024

In Western, Capitalist culture, this truthful summary is a stumbling block to everyone. Myself included (neither Jesus nor Paul would be deemed a "success" in today's wealth & success driven culture).

06/07/2024

"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father ... that you may know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to all the fulness of God." Paul (Ephesians 3).

God's mercifulness is infinitely more extensive than we can conceive. (paraphrasing Isaac of Nineveh)

06/01/2024

I find the literary symbolism in comparing the serpent & Eve with Jesus & Mary Magdalene to be very powerful.

In Gen 3, the deceitful serpent is alone with Eve in a garden enticing her with a deceiving, life-destroying falsehood she then shares with her husband that leads to ruin and death.

In John 20, the risen Jesus is alone with Mary in a garden uplifting her with a truthful, life-giving reality she then shares with the disciples that produces restoration and life.

05/07/2024

We lost a close sister and friend, Vera Stafford (pictured in the middle), to cancer recently. Vera had an extraordinary and difficult life - I can't even touch the hem. She lost a teenage son to su***de. She was a he**in addict and homeless for many years. We met her in a shelter as she was just coming off the street. Her life was transformed by faith and grace and we were blessed to have her as part of our church for the past 7 years. Her friendship was a great blessing for Melanie and myself. Over the past months she penned a large notebook full of spiritual thoughts to pass on to her family. I was honored to speak at her family's celebration of life this past Sunday. I've included one below that she asked to be read this week. It says a lot about her faith.